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How does fascism happen?

1/23/2026

When you look back at fascists, you see patterns of behavior that, while they are happening, don’t seem so nefarious individually. But when you add them up, a different story appears. For example:

Neutering the parliament/Congress
Emasculating the courts
Limiting press freedom slowly
Raiding journalists’ homes
Appointing only true loyalists
Banishing from their government anyone who doesn’t toe the line
Employing spokesmen who ignore questions and attack the questioner for a lack of patriotism
Employing spokesman who tell the public that it didn’t see what it saw
Investigating and charging perceived political enemies
Pardoning people convicted and/or confessing to crimes for no seeming reason
Threatening to cancel elections
Claiming a lost election is a rigged election
Redrawing political maps out to maintain control
Manipulating information to match their version of the truth
Lying
Bullying
Intimidating
Going around traditional institutions and creating their own
Unilaterally defunding programs they don’t agree with
Unilaterally changing laws without going through the traditional process
Taking down monuments of those they don’t agree with
Building monuments to yourself
Employing a masked police force

The list, unfortunately, goes on until someone stops it.

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As in life, focus political attention on what you can control

1/8/2026

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Giving a pep talk to his Republican House majority this week President Trump told them that if they lose the mid-term elections, “we’ll lose our country.”

As with many of his public proclamations, Trump is projecting.

This year the country truly could be lost if the midterms don’t give Democrats a majority in, at least, the House of Representatives. But it will be lost to one man – Trump – who believes he is the all-powerful Oz.

As he told his House members, he could be impeached if the Democrats regain control of the House.

And that is what’s important to Donald Trump.

Not losing a majority he can depend on for his policies, but a majority he can depend on not to impeach him.

Has the President committed impeachable actions? Probably.

At barest minimum he is violating the law a nearly unanimous Congress passed ordering his Administration to release the Epstein files. And that’s likely the least of his unconstitutional sins.

But let’s not go there right now.

The most important event this year is the mid-term elections. Do not let the President distract you from what’s at stake in this election.

With a Democrat-majority House, the Congress again will assert its Constitutional responsibility for oversight of the Executive Branch. The current weak Speaker of the House is just an extension of the White House. He is so ingrained in protecting this President and ignoring his Constitutional responsibilities, he may as well be a Cabinet member.

So, the goal:

Focus on the mid-terms and elect a Democratic majority in the House.

Controlling what this president does or says is not in your control. Don’t be distracted by it.

What is in your control: Your vote and support for candidates for election.

In our almost perfectly gerrymandered age, if you live in a district that is a foregone Democratic win, definitely support the Democratic candidate to be sure he or she wins. AND, send money or support of some kind into a contested district to boost the Democrat’s chances there.

The balance of power in the House is just a few votes. It won’t take a tsunami to take control. It will take focus, though.

I’m no supporter of the Democratic Party. But I am definitely a political opponent of this President and his unconstitutional ways.

Is he the legally elected President? Yes.

It wasn’t by a landslide, as he likes to say, but he did win. Just as Joe Biden won in 2020. I trust our elections.

His selfish manner -- his “me, me, me” approach to the presidency -- is the exact opposite of what we want or need in our leader. We want him more concerned about us, not whether he wins the Nobel Peace Prize.

Of course, do what it takes to win that prize. That’s what we want our presidents to do. Heck, that’s what the world wants the American president to do.

But do it because it’s the right thing to do. If the Prize comes along, good on you. (Fact: Only four U.S. presidents have won the Peace Prize, three while in office).

Donald Trump is all about Donald Trump. That’s not news.

Donald Trump lies. That’s not news.

Even in his “pep talk” to his House majority he told his party to moderate its most closely held stand – abortion – to win the election.

You don’t need to be told but here goes: One of the Republican Party’s longest held and most sacred official stands is anti-abortion. That’s not just their politics, it literally is religion to many. Some people are pro-choice Republicans, harkening back to the “Big Tent” days of the late former national Chairman Lee Atwater who saw abortion as a difference-maker in elections.

But their party’s president just told a huge part of his base – Christian Republicans (about 75 percent of the GOP base) – to moderate this most closely held belief.

In another age (actually just a few years ago), that would never have been even a thought on a Republican president’s mind, let alone to speak it out loud. But that’s how important this mid-term is to Donald Trump.

It must be equally important to those who oppose Trump’s unconstitutional approach to the presidency.

Focus on what you can do something about.

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How does fascism happen?

As in life, focus political attention on what you can control

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